Annealing with mini lathe

[GregLaROCHE]

I recently got a mini lathe. It’s been quite useful for a lot of things. The other day I was getting ready to anneal some brass my usual way by putting it in a socket turned by a drill motor and heated with a propane torch.

Then I thought why not try to use the mini lathe. I took a length of a three piece cleaning rod and chucked it in the lathe. I installed a used bronze brush that would slip into the case easily. Turned on the lathe to a speed I liked and held the torch on it. It worked great. A lot easier than the drill and socket method in my opinion.

Maybe someone else would like to try it.

[Winger Ed.]

Cool.
I see any project as the perfect reason to buy more power tools.

A while back, I scrounged a lathe.
Doing a gazillion brass at a time, I put that de-burring tool that's about the size of your thumb in it.
You can de-burr trimmed case mouths and GI primer pockets about as fast as you can talk about it.

[country gent]

I have used my mini lathe to trim deburr and chamfer cases. Modify rims, turn dummy rounds I want to see from wood and make parts tooling. I used a couple machine screws and dowels to bolt a piece of 1/2 X 3/4 as wide as the top of the tailstock flat on it in this is a 1/4" 28 threaded hole. I then bored a split ring with cross bolt to fit the spindle and clamp on. spotted the hole thru the block and drilled a clearance hole in face of ring opposite the split. A couple nuts and length of threaded rod and my tailstock now has a dead stop to work with. Makes trimming and other operations a lot easier. With little change an indicator could be mounted also. I mount the trimmer cutter /pilot in the head stock and a case holder in the tailstock with the guard down I don't need to start and stop the machine back off pilot change case and trim next one. The above operations are a lot easier with the tool post and stud removed

[rbuck351]

I mounted my HF mini lathe on my loading bench as I found it was way to useful to have at hand rather than running back and forth to the shop for some reloading use. Besides I have two more lathes in the shop.

I use Lee case trimmers with the cutter/pilot in the chuck and the case holder in a drill chuck in the tail stock. Just slide the tail stock until the cutter stops cutting, pull back and replace case and push in again. Switch cutter/pilot and case holder and deburr in and out.

Also make sizer dies and other loading tools. Need to get a mill next.